


Cry With a Smile

by WolfSquish



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Grief/Mourning, Hopeful Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Self-Hatred, mentions of injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-11
Updated: 2020-09-11
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:48:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25570846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WolfSquish/pseuds/WolfSquish
Summary: James and Lily are dead. Voldemort is defeated.This is Remus and Sirius in the first few days after that, trying to process the loss of their friends while raising Harry
Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Comments: 8
Kudos: 31
Collections: Wolfstar Hurt Fest





	1. Chapter 1

"Hagrid, he's my godson." Sirius pointed out gently as he reached for Harry again. James and Lily were gone, their house was ripped apart. 

And Hagrid was holding on to their son.

"Hagrid!" He repeated, his voice strangled as he tried to hold back yet another wave of tears. Tears could come later, when Harry was safe and he was sure Voldemort couldn't get to him.

Hagrid seemed to shake himself awake and cleared his throat, a snotty sound leaving him as he nodded and hugged the bundle that was Harry closer to his chest before finally handing him over. "Take care of the wee thing, yeah?" Hagrid managed while clutching his umbrella tightly.

Sirius just nodded as he made sure Harry was solidly in his grasp and got back on his bike. A moment later they were above the clouds, flying back to the small cabin he and Remus had been living in since Hogwarts. 

He tried to be as quiet as he could be, but there was no hiding the roar of his bike. Luckily, it seemed to calm Harry, who looked at him and the passing clouds curiously on the way there, though he started to cry as soon as they landed and Sirius turned off the bike. 

"Sirius?" Remus' voice was sleepy from the front door, light spilling out from behind him. 

"Get inside." Sirius said sharply, panic in his voice as he strode over to the cabin and pushed inside before locking the door behind him and putting up about two dozen extra protective spells, some of which they'd been putting on for months already. 

"Why do you have Harry?" Remus asked tiredly, very clearly trying not to jump to conclusions as he sat down on the backrest of their sofa while rubbing at his side; the full moon a week before had been rough on him. 

Sirius' wand clattered to the floor once he was done with the spells and he shook his head wordlessly as he slid down to the floor, cradling Harry and whispering soothing nothings in an attempt to get both himself and Harry to calm down. 

"I'm his godfather." He eventually managed, looking up to Remus with tear streaked cheeks. Remus shook his head in disbelief before walking over to sit on the floor with his partner. He knew a hug wasn't welcome but he needed to be close to him.

"Was it.. Him?" Remus asked with a trembling voice as he rested his hand on Harry's stomach in case he was having cramps and that was why he was crying. 

"Hagrid didn't say." Sirius said. He didn't care if it had been Voldemort himself. It wasn't a badge of honour, it wasn't... They were dead and that was all there was to it. Sirius hugged Harry to his chest and cried quietly, his shoulders shaking with it. 

Remus slowly moved to rest his head on Sirius' shoulder, too numb even to cry just then. "What do we do?" Sirius asked minutes, hours, later.

Remus shrugged before getting to his feet, picking Harry up as he did even though his body screamed in protest. 

"Right now, we cuddle up and try to sleep." He said simply before turning to their bedroom. Sirius would follow, or he wouldn't. 

Either way, chances were that it would fall to Remus to plan how to tackle their immediate future. Harry had an overnight bag and a camp bed at the cabin, but that wouldn't last them very long.

Remus had barely settled, watching Harry as he laid on his side, as Sirius slid into bed behind him with a sigh. "They're gone." He whispered as he buried his face in the crook of Remus' neck. 

"Yeah." Remus was finding it hard to manage to say anything else as he watched Harry and soaked in the warmth of Sirius against his back. "They're gone." He whispered as he reached for Sirius' hand, entwining their fingers and then squeezing tightly. 

Remus had gone numb as they laid there. He could feel Sirius cry quietly against his back, his forehead poking in between his shoulder blades uncomfortably. Harry miraculously slept through the night, and even Sirius got a few hours before dawn broke. Remus wasn't so lucky.

It was disorienting for Sirius to wake up to Harry staring at him, and without Remus to snuggle up to and maybe snog for a bit before they had to face their day. He groaned and rubbed at his eyes, which Harry took as his cue to open his mouth and start to wail. Sirius groaned again and then made his way over to Harry, who was reaching for him already.

"Are you a stinky boy?" Sirius asked in that voice that James mocked him for, with Peter nervously joining in. He sniffed at the general air around Harry but didn't smell anything, so he went to find Remus while bouncing the boy in his arms up and down in an attempt to calm him down. Remus was sat at the table with a cold cup of tea, his face in his hands. He didn't react as Sirius came in and dropped a kiss to his head. 

"Did you get any sleep at all?" He asked as Harry finally quieted down, now looking curiously at the way one of his uncles was acting. "Moony?" Sirius said, just a little louder as he started to make himself a cup of tea. 

Remus looked up with a sigh, his eyes red rimmed from the tears that had come to him in the early morning when everyone had been asleep and the hurt, both physical and emotional, had wrapped itself around his heart and squeezed. 

"No." He said in a flat voice, wincing as Harry started to cry again. "I couldn't sleep." He dragged himself to his feet to dump his cold tea and moved to take Harry from Sirius. "Can you start the formula? There should be some in his bag still." He said, barely even picking up his feet as he headed into their small bathroom to change Harry's diaper. 

Sirius sighed and nodded as he picked Remus' mug back out of the sink and went through the motions. Things didn't feel real. His friends couldn't be dead, Harry couldn't be theirs to look after and Remus couldn't be pushing him away like this when they could instead share their grief. He sighed and finished making their tea before finding his wand and spelling some bread slices into toast. 

He only remembered the formula moments before Remus returned with Harry. He totally deserved the disappointed look, but at the same time it didn't help his general feeling of inadequacy, of utter helplessness. 

Remus put Harry in a high chair and sat down with a heavy sigh. He'd planned things they'd need to get, and debated with himself if they would survive going to the Potters' to grab some of Harry's clothes as that would help with their limited budget. Sirius fussed over the formula with his back turned to Remus, just listening to the sounds of Harry babbling away. 

"I'm going to pick up Harry's stuff." Remus announced as Sirius screwed the cap on the bottle and almost dropped the bottle.

"Not alone you're not." Sirius said firmly as he turned around, his jaw set as he moved to sit down and picked Harry up to feed him. Remus sighed and rubbed a hand over the scar on his cheek.

"Sirius." He said simply, sounding almost as tired and defeated as he actually was. It was enough though; Sirius sighed and nodded as he adjusted the bottle in his hand. 

"Please come back." He whispered as Harry pushed the bottle away; he'd been eating mostly actual food for a while now and the bottle didn't fill him enough. It'd been a while since Remus and Sirius had babysat him, not since before the Fidelius charm had gone into effect. Sirius was glad he was holding Harry at the thought of the charm, that Peter had betrayed them.

Yet, a very large part of him couldn't believe that Peter actually had betrayed them. Maybe James had gotten careless, all caged up the way he'd been complaining of in his letters. It sounded a lot more believable to him than Peter betraying them. Peter was scared a lot, and that made him all the braver doing what he'd always done with the Marauders. 

Sirius swallowed thickly as he realised he'd been lost in his thoughts. Harry no longer was in his hands and Remus had plopped the toast down in front of him. "Sorry." He mumbled as he spotted Remus come out of their bedroom, hopefully having put Harry to bed. 

But Remus shook his head as he picked up the tea Sirius had prepared earlier. "Don't." He said in a tight voice. "I need to keep going, to make sure Harry's okay. If you start, even with apologising for things you should apologise for, I'm going to fall apart and I can't yet." 

Sirius sighed again and shook his head. "We're in this together, Moony." He pointed out quietly as he spread butter on his toast. "Especially now it would be great if you could at least pretend to believe that." He bit into his toast with a loud crunch, gesturing to his ears to indicate that he couldn't hear Remus' retort over the crunching as he ate.

And he ate slowly, as slowly as he could while Remus perched on the back of the sofa, arms crossed and watching Sirius with an unimpressed expression on his face. 

"You done?" Remus asked as Sirius eventually ran out of toast to go through. Sirius shrugged and started to do the dishes in the most passive aggressive way he could manage. 

"Sirius..." His partner's voice was a lot closer now, but Sirius remained focused on his task until Remus wrapped his arms around him from behind and rested his cheek against his shoulder blade. "I love you." He murmured as Sirius finally relaxed back against him just a little bit. 

"I love you too." Sirius whispered back, but Remus didn't hear him over the sigh as he let go of Sirius. "I'll try to be back before lunch." He promised. 


	2. Chapter 2

Remus shivered as he stepped out of the cabin and reapplied another layer of protective spells. He wrapped his cloak tighter around himself before turning on the spot, apparating to what was left of the Potters' house. He wasn't prepared for any of it though. Not the sea of flowers laid against their fence, not the destruction of the house itself, and most definitely not for the downright cheerful mood in the village.

He wanted to scream and yell at the people gathered near the house, but settled for glaring at them as angrily as he could as he made his way into the house. The last time he'd been there was shortly before the Fidelius charm was put into place. James and Lily had changed things. At least, he hoped the changes he saw were because of changes they'd made, and not a result of the... fight.

He swallowed thickly as he stepped through the ruined front door, wincing as his movements caused it to completely fall out of its hinges. The clang irritated his senses. It was the stupid door that had set him on edge, he told himself as he moved through the house and picked up toys and books for Harry. The roof had to be broken, he thought as he read through a few letters lying around; there were drops of water on them. He quickly put the letters into his pocket before turning to the stairs.

Only then did he realise something was missing from what he'd gathered from Sirius' mutterings in his sleep; Lily and James. Someone had moved their bodies. It was the first thing he could be glad about. He wasn't sure he would have survived if they'd been there. 

The stairs creaked underneath his feet as he climbed to the top, having to hold on to his bruised side. He might've cracked a rib after all, not that he was going to let anyone know that, especially not now.

He sniffled as he found Harry's room in ruins. The changing table had been blasted clean out with most of a wall, the remaining walls had scorch marks on them. The dresser was mostly unscathed, so Remus blindly emptied it into a bag he'd brought. Bile was rising in the back of his throat as all the destruction started to sink in. 

It hadn't felt real. Part of him still thought it wasn't, that this was the best way Dumbledore could think of to keep them safe. It didn't make a lot of sense to him, but he'd had his doubts about Dumbledore ever since he'd asked him to join the werewolves as a spy. He hadn't been able to do it and so he'd gone home. 

It dawned on him then, that this was his fault. He'd been home less than a day and then James and Lily died. They'd known. Somehow, his leaving had resulted in all of this. He clamped his mouth shut to keep the anguish inside, but he crumpled to his knees as silent tears ran down his face.

By the time he got to his feet, his knees were hurting, and the sun had shifted position. He wiped at his eyes and went back down the stairs. He went through to the kitchen to check what formula Harry was on now and quickly realised he was eating now. There were some jars of baby food, but not much else. So they'd need to figure out how to feed Harry now. 

He headed back to the living room and swallowed deeply as he glanced into the living room, which was completely untouched. He picked up the throw on the sofa and held it to his nose, just breathing in the mixed smell of James' cologne and Lily's perfume and Harry's baby smell. Then he tucked it away with Harry's clothes and apparated back home. He didn't think he could face the mostly happy crowd just then.

He dropped all the stuff he'd gathered except for the throw in the middle of their living room and without a word headed into their bedroom. He wrapped the throw around himself and collapsed into the bed. He didn't cry, he was too tired to cry. Too tired to even talk to Sirius, or hug Harry close and let simply holding him soothe his soul. 

He didn't deserve it, not after the conclusion he'd reached earlier. So he just laid there, letting the misery wash over him. He could vaguely hear Sirius and Harry move and go about the rest of their day, but neither came into the room. He wasn't too sure if he was grateful or resentful for it. Both, he decided when he thought about it for a little while.

Eventually, there was a knock at the door and Sirius let himself in, a sleeping Harry in his arms. "Come out please? You need to eat and we need to talk." Sirius said as he laid Harry down and tucked him in. He kissed his forehead before moving around the bed to Remus' side, sitting down on the edge there. 

Remus didn't move for a long moment before resting his head in Sirius' lap. They stayed like that until Sirius jumped up with a curse. "Dinner!" He said urgently before racing to the kitchen, leaving Remus to groan as his neck hadn't liked Sirius just jumping up the way he had. 

Slowly, he managed to get to his feet and move to the living room, where he plopped onto the sofa. Sirius came through with a few plates of food not too much later and sat down next to him. Neither was hungry and both forced themselves to eat anyway.

"It's my fault." Remus whispered when his throat refused to allow him to swallow another bite. "I abandoned the mission and they died days later." 

Sirius just stared at him as if he'd grown a second head. "No." He said firmly as he took Remus' plate and put it on the table to join his own. "We're not doing this, you hear me? We've been at war just about our whole lives; people die in wars. We are not blaming ourselves." Sirius shook his head as Remus opened his mouth to argue. "No, it is not your fault for recognising that you couldn't do it. And it's not my fault for thinking to be clever and make Peter the secret keeper. It is  _ not _ our fault."

Remus sighed and let himself fall sideways against Sirius. He closed his eyes and breathed out slowly. It was very clear he'd continued to blame himself as he usually did. Sirius wanted nothing more than to talk to him to convince him it wasn't his fault, but he still was bouncing too much between whose fault it  _ was _ to actually keep up with that. 

"We have to keep going, don't we? For Harry?" Remus said quietly when Sirius thought he'd been asleep already. 

"Yes." He replied simply before pressing a kiss to the top of Remus' head. "And for each other. I can't do this without you, and you can't do this without me." There was a time when even admitting that to himself wasn't something Sirius could do, but that was a long time ago now. A lifetime, it felt like, even though in reality it was only about five years.

"You really don't think it's my fault?" Remus asked softly, obviously knowing better than to ask whose fault Sirius did think it was. 

"Nope." Sirius popped the p and pulled Remus into a tight hug for a moment. "I do think you're exhausted though. So go shower, I'll wash up and we'll curl up in bed."

Remus nodded and stole a fleeting kiss, barely more than the brush of his lips against Sirius' before he headed into the bathroom. If he cried in there, well, no one would be able to tell the difference between the water and his tears. He couldn't lean on Sirius just yet; Sirius was barely hanging on, and needed the time to be able to support him.

So he towelled himself dry and put on his most comfortable pyjamas and curled up around Sirius, who in turn curled up around him.   
They'd get through it, eventually. For Harry, and for each other. 


End file.
